


Objects in Motion

by thirty2flavors



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/M, Gen, Missing Scene, Post Episode: s02e06 The Age of Steel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-19
Updated: 2015-07-19
Packaged: 2018-04-10 03:50:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4376099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thirty2flavors/pseuds/thirty2flavors
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I don’t think it’s wrong to know you’re going to miss someone. You just… can’t let yourself hold them back.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Objects in Motion

**Author's Note:**

> A while back I did a fic meme on Tumblr where I asked for DW episodes and promised to write fics related to them. This was, obviously, for Rise of the Cybermen/Age of Steel. 
> 
> A hat tip to anyone who spies the stealth cameo.

The Doctor lingered in the hallway by the door to Rose’s bedroom, unsure what he ought to do next.

They’d been staying at Jackie’s for two days now, ever since the TARDIS had made it back to its rightful universe with one fewer occupant. Rose had spent most of that time with her mother or her friend Shareen, and the Doctor had done his best to give her a wide berth. Accident or not, it was his TARDIS that had landed them on that parallel Earth, and that meant he was partially responsible for the fallout. 

He’d hoped some time back home would help her recalibrate, but he was beginning to wonder if that had been a mistake. Maybe being here was just causing her to wallow. Perhaps they’d be better off traveling, reminding her what good the TARDIS had to offer. That was the conventional wisdom about horse riding, wasn’t it? If you let one fall deter you, you might stop riding altogether.

Or maybe those were his own insecurities bleeding through. 

This might be precisely what Rose needed. What did he know? His own coping mechanisms certainly weren’t always ironclad. Maybe what was best for Rose would be if he backed away unnoticed and left her in peace. 

“I can feel you staring, you know,” she said, gesturing with her head for him to come join her.

Well, nevermind.

She was sitting on the end of her bed, staring down at something in her hands, and as he got closer the Doctor was unsurprised to find it was a photo of her with Mickey. Immediately he knew his earlier impulse was correct -- this was not in his wheelhouse. This was an element of the human experience he would never quite understand, something better left to the expertise of people like Jackie and Shareen. It didn’t get much more _domestic_ than this.

He sat down beside her anyway.

“Mickey’s twentieth,” said Rose, handing over the photo. The two of them were crammed together in a booth at some dimly-lit pub, Mickey holding a pint and Rose wearing a mile-wide smile. She was younger than he’d ever known her, and her long, straight hair was its natural brown. As a Time Lord he was intimately familiar with change, and yet he still found it difficult to reconcile the young girl in the photo with the woman sitting beside him. 

He found himself wondering if Rose felt the same, and if, at this moment, she’d consider the change a good thing.

“Came home _pissed_ ,” Rose went on, a laugh in her voice now. “Thought Mum was gonna have kittens.” She grinned at the memory, her tongue poking out from between her teeth for just a second before the expression faded. “Missed his last birthday.” Her voice was softer now, her eyes trained on the photo. “I was with you.”

The Doctor swallowed, once again feeling woefully ill-suited to this conversation. “I’m sorry.”

Rose shrugged, a simple gesture that managed to neither place nor remove blame. She worried her lip and looked down at the floor, bouncing one leg up and down, and the Doctor imagined that if she were assigning any blame, she was keeping it for herself. 

“I know I should be happy for him,” she said after a moment. “He’ll be happy there, and he’s got his gran. It’s just…” She took a deep breath. “I knew Mickey my whole life. Guess I thought he’d always be around.” Finally she looked up and met the Doctor’s eye, a self-deprecating smile on her lips. “That’s selfish, isn’t it?”

“I don’t think so,” he said. “I don’t think it’s wrong to know you’re going to miss someone. You just… can’t let yourself hold them back.”

“Yeah,” said Rose, although she didn’t sound convinced. With a visible attempt to rally herself, she perked up her tone. “So, that a first for you? Someone leaving for a whole other universe?”

“Actually, no. And last time she took my dog.” 

Rose’s eyes narrowed, her mouth pulling into a skeptical smile. “You’re having me on.”

“I’m not!” 

“Right, and when you say ‘dog’...”

“ _Well_ , robot dog, but the principle is the same!” 

But already he could tell she’d lost interest in the dog. Her smile dimmed, and the humour faded from her voice as she shook her head, looking at the floor again. 

“I can’t imagine it,” she said, a line appearing on her forehead as she tried to suss it out. “Just… staying on some planet somewhere. How could you give it up?”

There was something strange, he thought, in watching Rose wrestle with what he had long since accepted as a reality of the lifestyle he led. He shifted down the bedspread until their knees were side by side, smiling sadly.

This, at least, was his area of expertise.

“Everyone does, Rose,” he said gently. “For most people, the TARDIS is the journey, it’s not the destination.” He nudged her knee with his. “You might feel the same, one day.”

“No,” she said immediately. “I don’t think so.” 

That denial the strongest her voice had sounded all day, and it sent a thrill of relief down the Doctor’s spine that was quickly quenched by doubt. Experience taught him it was a promise she was destined to break. 

It was a nice idea, though.

“Well,” he murmured, “I hope you’re right.”

Silence swelled between them for a moment, and the Doctor scrambled to think of a way to take it back, to steer the conversation back to safety. 

But Rose beat him to it. She wiggled to bump his hip with hers, eyebrows raised. “So what did you do all day while I was with Shareen?”

The Doctor straightened his posture, adopting a look he knew to be both put-upon and heroic. “Your mother was shopping me around the estate, fixing electronics!”

Whether it was the words themselves or the expression, it had the desired effect: Rose laughed. “She did not!”

“She did! I’ve met quite a number of your neighbors now.”

She leaned against him, still laughing. “Well, that means she likes you, then, if she’s showing you off.”

He sniffed. “I don’t think it was _showing off_ , I think it was cheap labour. Do you know how many toasters I fixed today? Three! Three toasters! How are so many people breaking their toasters? It’s really not that complicated an appliance!”

But Rose shook her head. “Oh, come on, a bunch of strangers telling you how clever you are all day? You loved it.”

“Well, that’s every day for me.” Before she could say anything, he carried on: “Tell you what, that woman in 314 is quite a character.”

“You met Mrs Taylor?” A proper laugh burst out of her, the first he’d heard in days. “She’s wretched! Swears like a sailor, too, used to make Mum so mad when I was little.”

“Fixed her telly,” he nodded. “Made me tea. I think she liked me. Evidently I remind her of her grandson.”

Still snickering, Rose leaned her head against his arm. “Look at you, gone native.” She sobered a little, still resting against him. “We can leave, if you want. I’ll be fine.” A knowing smile spread across her lips. “I know you go barmy staying in one place for too long.”

It was a genuine offer, he could tell. Worry for him eclipsed her own needs, and maybe she was ready, anyway. Rose found it just as hard to sit still these days as he did. And she wasn’t wrong -- already he found himself itching to travel, to show her somewhere new, to find somewhere spectacular enough that losing one of her oldest friends felt like a worthy trade-off. 

Yet he found himself waving one hand.

“Nah, couple more days won’t hurt. Besides, I’ve promised Mrs Taylor I’d come watch Corrie with her tomorrow, and I don’t think she’s a woman I want to cross.”


End file.
